The European Union has confirmed that it plans to introduce an EU-wide digital wallet that will enable all EU citizens to link their national digital identity with other personal attributes including their driving licence, diplomas and bank account details and store them on their mobile phone.

The new European Digital Identity Wallet will be recognised in all 27 EU member states, allowing citizens, residents and businesses “to prove their identity and share electronic documents […] with the click of a button on their phone”, the European Commission says.

Potential use cases for the European Digital Identity Wallet include “accessing a bank account or applying for a loan, submitting tax declarations, enrolling in a university in your home country or abroad and many other things that you do with your normal means of identification”.

Users will be able to choose which aspects of their identity, data and documentation they share with third parties and ensure “that only information that needs to be shared will be shared”.

The EC adds that the European Digital Identity Wallet “will be built on the basis of trusted digital identities provided by member states, improving their effectiveness, extending their benefits to the private sector and offering personal digital wallets that are safe, free, convenient to use and protect personal data”.

“The European digital identity will enable us to do in any member state as we do at home without any extra cost and fewer hurdles,” EU commissioner Margrethe Vestager says.

“Be that renting a flat or opening a bank account outside of our home country. And do this in a way that is secure and transparent. So that we will decide how much information we wish to share about ourselves, with whom and for what purpose.

“This is a unique opportunity to take us all further into experiencing what it means to live in Europe, and to be European.”

The EC says that work on developing, adopting and implementing a “common toolbox” for the implementation of a European Digital Identity Framework will start “immediately” with the aim of agreeing the framework by October 2022 prior to launching a pilot programme.

Reports that the EU was to reveal plans for the new European Digital Identity Wallet appeared earlier this month.

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